Saturday, November 29, 2008

I found this picture on the Coming Attractions board at Chitra Talkies. My guess is that there is not a Tamil-speaker anywhere who wouldn't recognise him instantly. He is M. G. Ramachandran, known as MGR. MGR was an actor who used his immense popularity to become a successful politician. He became Chief Minister of the state of Tamil Nadu, of which Chennai is the capital, in which position he died in 1987.

Here is my summary of his movie Nan En Piranthen, "Why Was I Born?" (1972), one of the first Tamil movies I ever saw:MGR (who was 55 at the time) plays a man just returned from college. His face is pink with makeup, and every closeup is in soft-focus. He is the sum of all virtues. During the title song he persuades drunkards to stop drinking toddy, stops a gambling match, etc. He arrives at home to find that his family has become poor, because they have mortgaged everything to put him through college. He goes to the city to find a job.

Back at home, his evil sister-in-law keeps intercepting the mail and stealing the money that he sends, so she and MGR's family are evicted.

In the city MGR saves a child from being run over by a car. The driver of the car, an old friend who has become successful, gets him a good job and lets MGR use his house while he goes to Europe. Unfortunately the boss wants to hire a bachelor, so for the sake of his family MGR tells a lie! The boss has a daughter who is confined to a wheelchair by a psychosomatic illness. MGR cures the illness by singing to her, and she falls in love with him.After MGR's family is evicted they set out to search for him. Their clothes appear brand new, but are covered with large, neatly sewn patches in different colors, to indicate their poverty.The boss's daughter is kidnapped and threatened with a forced marriage. MGR saves her, confesses that he is already married, she persuades her father to forgive him, MGR is reunited with his family, and all ends happily.

One of the things this summary tells you is that marriage is at the centre of Indian culture. You cannot watch a movie or a TV show - or listen to many conversations - without quickly coming to the subject of marriage. A sample dialogue from a TV show might be: "Hello, how are you?" "How can you ask how I am? Don't you know I'm trying to get my daughter married?"The other thing this summary tells you is that MGR was the noblest of men. He made sure that the characters he played never had the slightest negative tone. In a country where people are obsessed with movies, this helped his political ambitions: people confused him with his character. In real life he made well-publicized gestures, like buying raincoats for cycle-rickshaw drivers during the monsoon, which also contributed to this image.Perhaps the most bizarre incident in MGR's life was right out of the movies: for reasons that I have never seen explained, M. R. Radha, who acted as a villain in many movies, including MGR's, shot him in the neck. MGR's speech was permanently affected, but his escape from death created a wave of sympathy which boosted his career.Manirathnam's beautiful Tamil film Iruvar told a fictionalised version of the story of MGR and his chief political rival. MGR's character was played by the Malayali actor Mohan Lal. The heroine was played by Hindi filmstar Aishwarya Rai, in her first film role.IruvarWhen I see a song from an old MGR movie on TV, it always makes me smile. He's so obviously counting the steps. Dancing was never his forte. At the end, the look of triumph on his face because he hasn't lost his balance makes me feel that I can keep mine too.

Thursday, November 27, 2008

In 1965, I joined the Independent Newspapers Ltd, as a freelance Reporter. The Newspaper office was located at Mihindu Mawatha, Colombo, and they published, Dawasa - the Sinhala morning Daily, Sun – the English morning daily, Weekend and Radha - a Tamil weekly. The Tamil weekly was edited by Nathan, who was earlier the Editor of the Tamil newspaper Thinakaran, published by the Lake House.In 1966, I was promoted as a Staff Reporter and in the same year the Company launched Dinapathy - the Tamil morning daily and Chinthamani - the weekly. S.T.Sivanayakam, who was at the time the Associate Editor of Virakesari was made the Chief Editor of Dinapathy, and K.K.Ratnasingham, the present Editor of Sudar Oli was the News Editor and Raja Ariaratnam, former Editor of Eelakesari, became the Editor of Chinthamani.In 1966, the newspaper company invited the South Indian matinee idol M.G.Ramachandran to Colombo. B.Sarojadevi who acted as heroin with him in many Tamil films, was also in his delegation that visited Colombo. The tour program of M.G.Ramachandran was arranged by our company and I was included on behalf of the newspaper group to accompany them in their visits.When I met M.G.Ramachandran for the first time in Colombo, I found him to be a very friendly person and I had the opportunity to be with him for more than 10 days, during the period he stayed in Colombo. He was taken to Jaffna, Batticaloa, Kandy and Nuwera Eliya. In Kandy, he told me that he was born in a Tea-estate in Kandy and he was very much excited by being in Kandy, his place of birth. He was named as Marudur Gopalan Ramachandran, a Malayalee by birth and was born on 17 January 1917, at Kandy. After the demise of Gopal Menon, his farther, he along with his elder brother Chakrapani and mother Satyabama, left Ceylon to Kumbakonam in South India. The widowed mother was unable to provide education either to his brother Chakrapani or to him. Ramachandran joined the Madurai Original Boys Drama company owned Kanadasamy Pillai. His first film debut was in 1935, a minor role in ‘Sathi Leelavathi.’ In 1945, he had his break and acted as the hero in the film ‘Rajakumari.’ This is how his life in the celluloid world began. When he visited Ceylon, he was one of the top leaders of the Dravida Munnetra Kalagam (DMK). When he left for Madras, he told me that, if I ever come to Madras, I should visit him. I never took that invitation seriously. I took that as the conventional parting courtesy words. Meanwhile, I learnt that there was an attempt on his life on 12 January 1967. He was shot by a fellow actor M.R.Radha and he suffered a bullet injury in his neck and was hospitalized. His picture with a bandage in the neck happened to be the biggest vote catcher in the 1967 elections for the DMK. He too got elected from the St.Thomas Mount constituency, by a big margin, from his hospital bed. In 1968, I toured with the Ceylon Cricket team (the name Sri Lanka came into existence after May 1972) to Madras, to play in the three day Gopalan Trophy match with the Tamil Nadu Cricket team. The team’s tour program started with a three day match with an Indian invitation team in Trichirapalli. While the match was on, suddenly there was some disturbances and I saw the spectatotors going towards one direction.I asked the Hari Baskar a high ranking IAS officer, who was seated next to our press box, the reason for the sudden distraction in the midst of the spectators. He told me that, M.G. Ramachandran has come to see the match for sometime and his fans are flocking him. That time, I remembered his invitation and told Hari Baskar about it. He advised me to send a note through his driver and I did accordingly. May be after thirty minutes, I saw a crowd moving towards the press box. In the midst of that crowd was M.G.Ramachandran, the unforgettable character. He came and hugged me and inquired about me. I told him that I came to India yesterday morning and would be in Madras after another three day match in Salem.In the evening after the close of play for the day, he came over to the hotel I was staying and I introduced him to our players and to the manager. He invited us for dinner, but we were unable to accept his kind invitation, as our program was already fixed by the Cricket board of Control. When we went to Madras, we were put up at the Victoria Hotel, Egmore. Here M.G.Ramachandran came and met us and invited all of us for a dinner at his Ramawaram Garden house. We all went and had a fine dinner. It was a memorable one for all of us. “M.G.R.” - he was popularly called and adored by millions all over, was the man of words and deed and I can’t forget about this gem of a person, with whom I happened to be in touch since for a very long time.

Monday, November 24, 2008

The idea of `bullet curing cancer’ incident in the latest magnum opus Dasavathaaram was in fact brought from the life of former Tamil Nadu Chief Minister and film icon M.G. Ramachandran (MGR), Kamal Hassan revealed in a press conference in Kochi on Monday, while attending a promo his latest film in which he enacted ten roles. "It was not just a fabricated tale. When MGR was shot in the neck, it was feared that it would affect his vocal chords," he said.

Wednesday, November 19, 2008

M.N.Nambiar ( Manjeri Narayan Nambiar) March 7, 1919 — November 19, 2008), a veteran film actor in Tamil cinema, he has been in the film industry for more than 73 years. He is a veteran of theatre and considered a legend in cinema. He is acknowledged to be one of the oldest actors from the pre-war era who remains in the industry today. He remains humble despite having worked with seven generations of actors.His voice has been famous among the people ,

After becoming popular in Tamil films he started his own drama troupe called Nambiar Nataka Mandram. They staged two plays — `Kaviyin Kanavu' and a comedy play `Kalyana Supermarket.'

M.N. Nambiar is an ardent devotee of Sabarimala Sri Ayyappan. He has had a long association with the temple, and visited the shrine more than 65 years over the last half a century; this has led to him being called Maha Guruswamy.

Monday, November 17, 2008

MGR had acted in several of MK Thiagaraja Bagavathar's films. When he ws the CM he wanted to change the name of Tiruchy Kalai Arangu into Thiagaraja Bagavathar Kalai Arangu. The date was 2 October 1981. MGR was sceduled to appear at 11.30 in the morning. From 11.00 am onwards no song was played. At 11.30 MGR arrived in his car and alighteed. As he came out of his car this song was played "Vathanamey Chandra Bimbamo" to the thunderous applause and cheersing of the massive crowd there. MGR could not control his smile. He smiled and waved at the crowd. The crowd became more hysteric.

Tuesday, November 4, 2008

Telugu Paper VARTHA has written about Thiru M.G.R,NTR and Shoban babu ,Titled as Maha Natullu(Maha nadigargal)

While shooting of Ulagam Sutrum Valiban ,thiru MGR did not pay,who ever worked for the film for excess budget of the movie .After finishing the movie and was released ,the first talk was the movie was a flop and had false reviews, but the film was a Major hit from the start.

Few days later at the time of release thiru M.G.R called everyone who worked for the film and his P.A asked everyone what is expectation of the payment of each of them wanted.

Everyone asked double of the payment (for eg : 1000Rs they asked for 2000Rs) ,they thought if they ask high atleast they will get half of the payment.

But the godly matinee idol thiru M.G.R offered Triple of the payment to everybody who work the film Ulagam Sutrum Valiban and M.G.R said "everybody deserves this , as you are like a family to me . ".